I'm off to spend the next week at an Open University summer school, teaching first year technology students about the structures of bridges and planes, and the uses and limitations of mathematical, physical and computer models.

Hector MacQueen, law professor at Edinburg University, points to an email alert from the editors of World Intellectual Property Report, entitled IP Commission OKs Spying on Internet Users to Protect Copyright:

"PARIS--A copyright advisory board within France's Ministry of Culture
has accepted government plans to increase surveillance of Internet
users as part of a wider bid to stop illegal copying and transmission
of protected artistic works in cyberspace.
The Superior Council for Artistic and Literary Intellectual Property
(Conseil Superieur de la Propriete Litteraire et Artistique, or
CSPLA) announced June 26 that it would support proposed legislation
now working its way through Parliament that aims to adapt copyright
protection to the Digital Age, principally through greater spying on
Internet users.
The CSPLA opinion was issued in response to parliamentary debate on
legislation -- the Law on the Digital Economy -- that would adopt
European Union Directive 2001/29/EC, of May 22, 2001, on the
Harmonization of Certain Aspects of Copyright and Related Rights in
the Information Society.
A united version of the legislation -- combining a text approved
last February by the National Assembly, or lower house, of
Parliament, and one approved by the Senate, or upper house, in late
June -- is expected to be passed by Parliament by year-end, after
fine-tuning by members of both houses and concerned government
ministries.
The CSPLA opinion -- which demands "reconciliation" between long-
standing concerns over privacy protection and individual liberties
and the growing need for copyright protection on-line -- is likely to
weigh heavy with Culture Ministry officials when they are asked for
future comment on the bill.
(The full report will appear in the August issue of World E-Commerce
& IP Report. Copyright 2003, BNA International Inc.) "

Thursday, July 17, 2003

Two democrats are proposing a bill, Author, Consumer, and Computer Owner Protection
and Security (ACCOPS) Act of 2003, that would lead to jail time for file sharers. One of these, Howard Berman, was the guy who previously introduced a bill to provide copyright holders with immunity for damaging other people's computers.

Copyfight has lots of links to pieces on Berman's proposal.
Whilst Berman wants to jail file sharers, the head of Interpol wants a global crackdown on piracy which he links to terrorism.